Nothing Ever So Final
by MedicOnDuty
Summary: It's January 3, 1944, and the Black Sheep's luck has run out on a raid over Rabaul. How will Jim Gutterman, the squadron's second in command, cope with the loss of Pappy?


_January 3, 1944._

Through the chaos of battle, through aircraft weaving in and out of the scattered clouds that hung heavy in the gray-blue sky, Jim Gutterman's eye was suddenly caught by the dark blue Corsair with the white 86 emblazoned on its side. Lulubelle, his squadron commander, Greg Boyington's, aircraft. He watched as she wove and wound her way behind a Japanese Zero, poised to strike. Jim held his breath. _If Pappy made this kill, it would not only be his second one today, but it would be his twenty-seventh, officially putting him one ahead of the current tied score of twenty-six._ The Zeke banked sharply in front of Pappy's Corsair and the rounds just barely missed. Jim let out a disappointed breath. _Too bad. But there would be other chances, maybe even today_.

Then he saw it. He recognized the red circles on the silver wings before his brain had put together that he was looking at an entire Japanese fighter, lined up behind Pappy's Corsair, lined up for the kill. And Pappy, focused on doing battle with the aircraft in front of him, hadn't noticed. Before Jim's brain was able to assemble all of the pieces into coherent thought, he saw the Japanese aircraft's rounds rip into the Corsair's fuselage. Lulubelle dipped forward and into the clouds.

Jim banked, dropping altitude, trying to get underneath the clouds, trying to see whether Pappy's white parachute was floating toward the water below, when a row of bullets stitched into the right wing of his Corsair, bringing him back into the fight. _How could he have been so stupid - he'd completely forgotten his surroundings!_ He reacted instinctively, rolling his fighter to the side, banking sharply, and trying to locate the enemy aircraft before he himself became just another pilot falling from the sky.

All around him, American aircraft were desperately trying to get away from the swarm of Zeroes that had jumped them. They were outnumbered two-to-one, at least, and things didn't look like they were going to improve. Jim had the sinking feeling that their luck had finally given out on this raid on Rabaul. Not just the Black Sheep's, either, but that of all the squadrons taking part in the mission - six in total - which were being hacked to pieces in the unfriendly skies. Though, if nothing else, they were taking a lot of Japanese with them.

Eventually, damaged aircraft began limping toward home and those that were still in fighting condition broke off and returned to regroup with what was left of their comrades. With a look toward the island far below, Jim turned toward home and closed up with what remained of the Black Sheep in something vaguely resembling a formation. By all intents, they had been among the lucky ones out of the the six squadrons that had left Bougainville before daybreak that morning, each with eight aircraft. The Black Sheep had six left. This meant they were returning with most of their pilots while other squadrons were not so lucky. But it also meant they'd lost two of their own. Jim looked around at the Corsairs struggling to keep in formation. Casey's had taken heavy damage. Wiley's had been hit and was trailing a black smoke. Pappy and Bragg were gone.

...

It was not until the very late afternoon, just as the sun began to set behind the mountain at the center of Vella La Cava, that the remaining Black Sheep set down on their home runway where they were met by their ground crews who were ready to work on these old birds, fix them up for the next day (and the one after and the one after that) of being shot to pieces. Always the same. Each mission, someone may not return, someone may bring an aircraft back as full of holes as a Swiss cheese. And yet, every day after, they went back in the air. Micklin, who gave them no end of grief about the damage they did to his beautiful aircraft, said nothing to them this night when he'd realized they had limped back without their commander. He may have been fiercely protective of his Corsairs, but for all his brashness, he also knew when to keep his mouth shut and just get his mechanics to work.

Jim sat in his aircraft as the propeller slowed, then finally came to a stop. He pushed the canopy backward, but then sank back into his seat, making no attempt to get out. His crew chief, a quiet Marine who minded his own business and left other people to theirs, pushed chock blocks underneath the wheels, checked out the damage to the bird's wing, and then left to assemble the necessary parts from the bone yard of damaged Corsairs that served as their source of spare bits and pieces, themselves being no longer repairable.

Jim's eyes fell onto Meatball, Pappy's dog, who was sitting faithfully by the runway, waiting for his master to come home, and Jim realized that this may well be the end of the Black Sheep. Right here. Without Pappy, there were no Black Sheep - he was the glue that held them together and made them strong. If Pappy was gone - what were they, outside of a gaggle of pilots and a random squadron number? They were no longer the Black Sheep.

Slowly, the finality of what had happened dawned on Jim. Of course, he did not actually see Pappy's Corsair crash into the water or break apart midair - but even so, was there any sense at all in telling himself Pappy could still be alive? That some kind of miracle had happened and things would return to normal? _Even if he were still alive, it would make little difference_, Jim thought, _because he would have been captured by the Japanese and that could very well be the same as being dead already_.

Jim's heart hammered in his chest as these thoughts raced around his mind. He'd felt like this once before, the time T.J. had accidentally fired on Pappy's plane, causing him to bail out over a Japanese-held island. It seemed like this had happened a very long time ago. When Jim had realized then that he was next in command, that he had to take over, he'd realized he didn't have what it took. Not even close. Instead of stepping up to the plate and taking command, he'd taken to his tent, curled up on his cot with a bottle of booze, snapping at anyone who'd tried to even talk to him. That was not the mark of a good squadron commander, of any kind of a squadron commander. He cupped his face in his hands. How was he going to be able to do it this time? Deep down, Jim knew the answer only too clearly: he wouldn't. He wasn't up to the task. Because he'd not just lost a squadron commander who needed to be replaced, he'd lost a friend - he'd lost his best friend, the one person who kept him going in the right direction, doing the right thing, keeping him going on.

As the last of the light disappeared behind the mountain, Jim felt the darkness overwhelming him. He took a deep breath, took of his cloth flying helmet, and placed it over the gun sight on top his instrument panel. He stood up in the cockpit, climbed over the side and onto the wing. As he stood on the wing, he took off his Mae Vest, tucked the straps neatly underneath it, and placed it on the seat of his aircraft. He reached for the smooth pearl grips of his pistol and pulled it from the leather shoulder holster. He looked at it for a minute, then gently placed it on top of the Mae Vest. And then he sat on the wing of his Corsair and just waited. He didn't know for what, exactly.

...

Night had long fallen and the Black Sheep, still reeling from the day's events, had slowly made their way into the Sheep Pen for a subdued get-together to remember those they had lost that day. Casey brought a bottle of scotch, of Vat 69, that he had traded for some time ago and had saved for a special occasion. He'd been planning to surprise Pappy with it on his twenty-sixth kill, the one that would tie him for the current record in the Pacific. Instead, he now divvied it up among the assorted canteen cups and mugs placed on the bar before him, and they drank it in Pappy's memory.

It was then that Casey, still holding the bottle from filling the two empty glasses that sat side-by-side at the end of the bar, one for Greg Boyington and one for Jerry Bragg, noticed he didn't see Gutterman's trademark cowboy hat among the small crowd in the Sheep Pen. He craned his neck but no, not even at the back of the room. Not sitting down at any of the tables. Casey placed the bottle on the bar and quietly walked outside to look for him. Where could Gutterman be? He did return with them, did he not? The day's events were still a haze in Casey's mind. Maybe he just didn't remember if Gutterman had to land elsewhere due to damage to his aircraft? But he'd check all the same. He tried Gutterman's tent - nothing. He walked the short distance down to the beach, but it was deserted. Eventually, he walked up to the row of dark-blue aircraft and found Jim sitting on the wing of his Corsair.

"Come have a glass for Pappy," Casey said. When Jim did not respond at all, did not even look at him, he climbed onto the wing. "Are you alright? Are you injured?" He was getting worried. This was out of character for Jim. Jim, who was always quick to argue, quick to be angry, even a bit of a jerk a fair bit of the time. This wasn't him. This was like the last time Pappy had been missing and Jim hadn't dealt with it well then.

"There's a search mission underway," Casey said truthfully, as he had heard the radio traffic in the operations shack after their return. "They won't stop until they find him. You know they won't. General Moore won't let them." He realized the last sentence sounded more pleading than convinced.

Jim shrugged.

"Did ... did he not make it?" It occurred to Casey that Jim's reaction wasn't because Pappy was missing but because he'd seen him, actually seen him, killed. In all the confusion in the skies, for all he knew, Jim may have been the only one to see what really happened. "Did you see?!" Casey asked, his voice rising with urgency.

Jim shook his head.

"So they'll look. They won't stop until they find him. They'll..." He didn't know what to say. "It will be like last time," he tried. "You just need to keep the Squadron going until Pappy comes back."

Jim looked down. "I quit," he said.

"What?"

"The war. I quit." Jim slid off the wing of the Corsair and started walking toward the beach at a brisk pace. Casey jumped off the wing and ran after him. "What do you mean, you quit?" he asked, unsure whether he needed to shout at Gutterman or whether this was the time to become incredibly concerned over what was going on. "You can't quit. It doesn't work that way! Pappy wouldn't want..."

"Yeah, well, Pappy is dead!" Gutterman shouted, rounding on Casey and pushing him, hard, in the chest. Casey stumbled backward, taken by surprise both by the physical attack and the finality of Jim's words, then regained his footing and tried to grab Jim's arm, to stop him. "You don't know..." Casey's voice faltered. The pale moon that had now risen had caught Gutterman's face wet with tears as he turned back away and continued his way to the beach. Casey didn't know what to say or do, so he followed at a distance. He wished he wasn't alone with Jim, that he had some backup. He didn't know where this was going and he certainly didn't know what he was supposed to do. He watched as Gutterman walked straight out into the waves and stood waist-deep in the cool water.

Everything around them sounded unnaturally loud. The waves rolling onto the shore. The bugs in the tall grass. The wind playing in the palm trees.

"I'm such an idiot," Jim said to nobody in particular. "I left my pistol in my plane." Casey knew what he meant, but he didn't know what he could do or say that would make any difference. Eventually, he waded out into the water next to his fellow pilot, his friend. He put a hand on his shoulder. "Jim? We need to ... we've got to get back. There's ... We have things to get done. You should come have some of that scotch."

...

_January 4, 1944._

The white and gray C-47 that brought supplies, mail, and replacement parts for their damaged aircraft each week rolled to a stop at the edge of the runway, the engines slowly coming to a halt as its side-door was already flung downward. Some of the Black Sheep's ground crew members began to off-load boxes that were handed out to them by the aircraft's loadmaster. The last bag off the plane was the mail, ordinarily a reason for celebration as it came irregularly and took months to complete the journey from home. This morning, there was no celebration, only quiet efficiency as things were unloaded.

Gutterman was standing surrounded by Casey, TJ and French near the aircraft, waiting for all of the unloading to get done. He was still wearing what he'd worn the day before, right down to his rough-out boots which hadn't fully dried yet after last night. He hadn't shaved. He wore his empty pistol holster. His eyes had a dull, far-away look to them. None of them talked because nobody knew what to say. When the loadmaster told Gutterman to get on the plane, T.J. awkwardly said, "Well ... uh ... you take care." He felt like an idiot as soon as he'd said it.

As the door closed behind Gutterman and the engines of the C-47 sprung back to life, nothing had ever seemed so final.

...

* * *

**Author's Notes**

Sadly, "Black Sheep Squadron" was canceled in the second season after a total of only 37 episodes, which means that, unlike M*A*S*H, the Black Sheep never had any kind of formal end and send off. I thought I would give it an ending.

I based my ending in part on the true historical events.

On January 3, 1944, the Black Sheep were part of a 48-aircraft raid on Rabaul where they were jumped by more than 70 Japanese fighters. During the aerial combat that followed, Greg Boyington, who'd scored his 26th victory earlier that day, was shot down and had to bail out. Because nobody saw him bail out and nobody saw the plane crash, he was officially listed as missing in action. He had, in fact, made it out safely and had been picked up by a Japanese submarine. He spent the next 20 months as a prisoner of the Japanese. The Black Sheep also lost Pappy's wingman, George Ashmun, on this raid.

I chose to tell the story from Jim Gutterman's perspective because, watching the show again as an adult, I'm starting to really appreciate the complexity of his character. On one hand, he can be very arrogant and easily angry; sometimes he's just a complete jerk - as in "High Jinx" when he was dogging the hell out of Doug Rafferty for being "bad luck" - and on the other hand he's got this extremely vulnerable side that just can't cope when he's faced with Pappy being gone, as in "Small War" (and, of course, we saw that again at the end of "High Jinx"). Jim is one of my favorites, but I don't think he would have been able to cope with Pappy being killed. (He doesn't know, of course, that he was captured.)

The alternative ending for this story would be, obviously, that Jim takes a repaired and refueled Corsair to get revenge for Pappy's death and is killed. In reality, the Black Sheep disbanded on January 8th, five days after Pappy was shot down and captured, and the pilots were sent to other squadrons as replacements.

...

Image credit: F4U Corsairs of the actual VMF-214, 1944. Public domain.


End file.
